Ramblings of an outdoor person trapped indoors.

A Compendium of Appalachian Trail Hikes

Over the past several weeks, Carl and I have cycled back towards hiking segments of the Maryland Appalachian trail in 6-7 mile segments. Since the AT is a long linear trail, the hikes were either eco-friendly one car out and backs, or OPEC-friendly two car one way hikes, generally working our way north along Maryland's 30 miles or so of the AT.

I will let pictures provide the proverbial thousands of words.

The southern-most segment of the AT in Maryland is really on the C&O Towpath from Harpers Ferry to Weverton Cliffs. At the starting point, Carl noticed a weird transmogrification machine that turned his head into a cyclops robot when he got too close to it.

At the Harpers Ferry end you reach the old tunnel that now has a chain link fence keeping you out, since it is an active rail line, but years ago you used to be able to walk right in.

An artist's rendering of the C&O Towpath, which runs from Washington DC to Cumberland MD and then turns into the Allegheny Passage Trail that runs all the way to Pittsburgh, PA.

North on the AT brings you to Gathland State Park with a bunch of old buildings. This is one.

North of Gathland you come to Lamb's Knoll and a nice viewpoint of the snow-free hills we have had all winter long this year.

About 3 miles north of Lamb's Knoll you cross Reno Monument Road with a bunch of official Civil War monuments, but there is an odd side path that takes to into the woods to the above, very odd Confederate memorial. Apparently "Deo Vindice" means "God Will Vindicate" and was the motto of the Confederacy, but I'm pretty sure vindication did not come to the slave-holding side of that war.

Ralph Waldo Emerson once said "A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds." In keeping with RWE's wisdom, we randomly hiked up by Liberty Reservoir, which for the past several years has been at low water levels due to near-drought conditions here. However, we've had a lot of rain and the dam has an impressive spillover. Carl and I did some "pay it forward" as some hikers passed us in the opposite direction. Carl spotted some crumpled up $20 bills on the path, and the little angels on our shoulders quickly pummeled the little devils on the other shoulders into submission and we gave the grateful hikers back their money. I later found a coupon for a free Egg McMuffin, which for me is probably really the little devil's revenge.